


The Ghosts of Matthew Murdock

by 94BottlesOfSnapple



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Foggy Nelson Cries a Lot, Gen, Gen if you squint and ignore the forehead kisses, Ghosts, Halloween, M/M, Reunions, Season/Series 03, alternate reunion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-03
Updated: 2018-11-03
Packaged: 2019-08-16 20:28:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,756
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16502180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/94BottlesOfSnapple/pseuds/94BottlesOfSnapple
Summary: In Foggy’s experience, weird shit only happens to you on Halloween if you go looking for it. But apparently just having known Matt Murdock is close enough to “looking for it” to count, so he’ll have to roll with the punches. Meeting three different, equally troubled versions of your dead best friend is a really shitty thing to have to roll with, though.





	The Ghosts of Matthew Murdock

**Author's Note:**

> I spent literally all day writing this because it would not let me go, so... Here it is.

It’s 5:53pm on October 31st, and Foggy wakes from a nightmare. It’s not a Halloween thing, though; he always wakes from a nightmare these days. He’s alone in his apartment, lying on the couch with the brief he’d been going over this afternoon scattered on the floor. His ears are still ringing with bright, unselfconscious laughter. Matt’s drunk laugh. The one Foggy will never hear again because Matt’s dead and it’s all Foggy’s fault. If he hadn’t given Matt the Daredevil armor, if he’d just— If he’d only—

 _Tap, tap, tap_ , goes the door. Foggy stares at it blearily, uncomprehending. _Tap, tap, tap_.

Someone’s knocking.

Although he wants to tell them to go away, he scrambles to his feet and opens the door. Maybe Marci forgot her key, he thinks, even though he knows she’d have no qualms about calling for him through the door.

It’s not Marci.

It’s a kid. A stranger, Foggy wants to say, but he knows that face. It can’t be Matt. It’s literally impossible that this scrawny ten-year-old is Matt Murdock. Mostly because Matt’s dead but also because even if he were alive he’d be about two decades older.

But with the dark, messy hair and the cane and the ill-fitting clothes, who else could it be? Foggy squeezes his eyes shut, takes a rattling breath. Someone up there really hates him.

“Matt?” he asks the boy, fighting hard to keep his voice from cracking.

When Foggy opens his eyes again, the kid’s posture has gone tight and tense.

“How do you know my name?”

In Foggy’s experience, weird shit only happens to you on Halloween if you go looking for it. But apparently just having known Matt Murdock is close enough to “looking for it” to count. Foggy doesn’t know whether to sigh or laugh or cry, so he does some horrible combination of all three, his heart pounding painfully against his chest like it wants to escape, like it wants to leap into the hands of this boy who will one day grow into the man Foggy loved.

“It’s a long story,” he tells Matt at last, trying for a smile; it wobbles on his face and threatens to break into a million pieces, but he at least manages one. “Did you need something, Matt?”

“... I’m. I’m lost,” Matt admits, twisting his cane in his hands.

 _You’re not lost_ , Foggy wants to say, _you’re home. You belong here with me, you always have_. But it’s not true, not really. This Matt is a child. This Matt doesn’t know him. And even if he did, Foggy knows better than to inflate his importance. Just because Matt was his home doesn’t mean he was Matt’s.

“I can help you get where you need to go,” Foggy offers, because what else can he do?

Matt shrugs, turns his face down and away.

“I don’t want— I ran away. I don’t want to go back.”

To the orphanage, Foggy guesses, and his heart aches. He opens his door wider, an invitation for the impossible boy on the other side.

“Then why don’t you come in? You can wait with me until you decide where you want to go.” Matt hesitates — of course he does, being invited into some strange man’s apartment. “I promise you’ll be safe here, Matt. I would never let anything hurt you.”

The way Matt’s little face goes slack — disbelief, confusion, awe — is just one more pinch of pain to add to the pile. He can hear Foggy’s heart and knows he’s not lying, but he’s baffled by it. By someone willing to do anything to keep him safe. Foggy rubs at his eyes, tries to force down the urge to cry. Finally, Matt takes a step inside. Then another, and another. He taps his way over to the couch and sits on it, then sets down his cane and crosses his arms tight against his chest. Somehow, Foggy knows Matt wants to hug his legs but is forcing himself not to. He’s so... He’s angry, hurt, troubled — all painfully easy to read on his face even when it’s so much younger than the one Foggy knew. With a quiet sigh, Foggy resigns himself to this— haunting, and shuts the door quietly. He leaves it unlocked.

Instead of sitting on the couch next to Matt, Foggy takes a chair — one that doesn’t put him between Matt and the door.

“... Who are you?” Matt asks, picking uneasily at the sleeve of his too-large jacket.

“Foggy Nelson. We were— We’ll be friends someday.”

“Friends, huh?”

Matt seems... Skeptical, yeah, but also a little bit touched by the idea.

“You and me, pal, best friends,” Foggy promises just to watch the way the idea of a best friend makes Matt’s face light up.

The expression is quashed hurriedly, but Foggy sees it and that’s really all he wanted.

“Only babies need friends,” Matt insists hurriedly, as if to make up for his slip. “I don’t need anyone.”

Which is probably the sort of bullshit Matt’s douchey ninja mentor fed to him. Foggy has a sudden, sharp urge to take a crack at the guy with his softball bat. No wonder adult Matt was such an emotionally-fucked compulsive liar if that was the sort of thing he grew up hearing.

But Matt doesn’t take direct challenges to his worldview well. So Foggy knows just telling him that’s complete crap and that everyone needs friends isn’t gonna fly. And even if this Matt is a ghost or a dream or a hallucination... He’s also just a little kid. He deserves better, and Foggy wants to help him if he can.

“I needed  _you_ ,” he admits honestly, digging deep into those festering parts of himself that he isn’t sure will ever heal. “Always did.”

Matt doesn’t reply to that, not verbally, but Foggy can see his bottom lip trembling the way it always does when he’s trying not to cry. Then, one hand pushing up his sunglasses a little to scrub at his eye, Matt pats the cushion next to him on the couch. Slowly, Foggy stands and makes his way over — drops onto the couch next to Matt.

Almost immediately, his arms are full of a scrawny, wailing little boy. Matt screams as he sobs, the words angry and incoherent as he muffles them in Foggy’s chest.

“—fair!” Foggy manages to pick out at one point. “He left me! It isn’t fair, it isn’t fair!!”

Foggy has no idea whether Matt’s talking about Stick or Jack, and he’s not sure he wants to. He just holds him through it, smoothing a hand through Matt’s hair and humming quietly in agreement. He’s reminded suddenly of Theo, at the same age — similar in size but so different, little huffing sobs that took too much air for any kind of shout or scream. Matt finally tuckers himself out and falls quiet with his ear pressed over Foggy’s heart, still shaking with tiny hiccupping sobs. Foggy desperately wants to tell Matt that he’ll never leave him, but he knows the words would ring false — he’s left Matt twice. And now Matt’s left him, in the worst way possible. He can’t promise this little boy a forever friendship, not in the way he needs. But there is one thing he can say with utmost honesty.

“I’ll always come back for you, Matt. As long as I can.”

Foggy doesn’t expect a response, but he gets it.

“I believe you,” Matt tells him, clutching the fabric of Foggy’s shirt tighter in his little fist.

They sit like that for a long, long time, until Matt’s breathing settles. When he moves to put distance between them, Foggy lets him go — but Matt doesn’t go far. He settles right next to Foggy in the couch, scrubbing tears from his face.

The silence is broken by a shaky sigh that sounds like it takes all the air in Matt’s small lungs.

“I died, didn’t I?” he asks.

Foggy doesn’t... He really, really doesn’t want to answer that. Not to himself but especially not to this kid. To this tiny, brittle Matt who’s already been through too much. Who ran away but desperately didn’t want to be alone.

“I’ll know if you lie,” Matt insists, his jaw set with a familiar stubbornness.

“Yes,” Foggy admits, barely a breath behind the word. “Yes, you— he died.”

Matt nods, like he understands.

“My grandmother always said the Murdock boys have the Devil in them,” he explains quietly, face aimed down at his toes. “If I— if something happened to me, if I got in a fight that killed me, it’s not your fault. That’s just what I am.”

“No, Matty,” Foggy says, and has to sniff hard to try and stall his runny nose. “No, it’s not your fault. You saved us. You saved the whole city. You are so, so good. You’re gonna grow up and be a great man.”

The whole world kaleidoscopes, refracted by the tears welling up in Foggy’s eyes. He sniffs again, takes a ragged breath through his mouth.

“Foggy...”

“I don’t know how to live without you,” Foggy admits, his voice breaking.

He knows he shouldn’t say this, especially not to a version of Matt that’s so young, a version of Matt that doesn’t need any more weight on his prepubescent shoulders. With a quiet sob, Foggy rubs the back of his hand against his dripping nose like he’s a kid himself.

“Maybe you don’t have to,” Matt offers, swinging his legs a little.

Foggy barks out a soft, strained laugh. He’s not a hero, he’s not a time traveler or a miracle worker. He’s just a lawyer. There’s nothing he can do to bring Matt back.

“Think so?” he asks kindly, instead of voicing any of those thoughts.

Matt nods decisively.

“I do.”

He reaches out with a small, fumbling hand and presses his palm to Foggy’s wet cheek. Foggy covers that tiny hand with his own, closes his eyes and tries to breathe. And then there’s a forehead pressed to his, a thin arm looped around his neck.

“Thank you, Foggy,” Matt tells him. “For letting me in. I hope you find what you’re looking for.”

And then just like that, Foggy is alone again. The only hand on his cheek is his own. He opens his eyes to an empty apartment, and another sob tears itself out of his chest. In an empty haze, still crying, Foggy stumbles his way to a box of tissues and uses about fifty before his nose finally stops dripping snot.

“What the _fuck_ was that?” he demands hoarsely — of Matt, of God, of the world at large. “What the fuck did I ever do to deserve that?”

It’s some Christmas Carol bullshit come to torture Foggy about his best friend’s death all over again and he’s not going to stand for it. He scribbles out a note on the pad of paper he and Marci usually use for grocery lists, and then he flees the apartment, barely remembering to lock it behind him. Maybe Ebenezer Scrooge was down to stay in his house and get fucked with by ghosts, but Foggy doesn’t have the stomach for it. He’ll stay out all night if he has to, hopping from Halloween party to Halloween party or bar to bar or even holing up in Nelson’s Meats for the night like the plucked chicken he is. If he’s still hallucinating Matts tomorrow, he’ll hie himself to a doctor, or whatever. But he’s pretty sure it’s a Halloween thing. Probably. Matt had felt warm and real under his hands, and Foggy doesn’t think he’s far gone enough to be having tactile hallucinations.

Either way, he wants to be as far from his apartment as possible, so he powerwalks down the streets, hardly paying any attention to where he’s going. He keeps going for a long time. Long enough that his feet begin to hurt but he keeps going anyways.

“Foggy?”

He stumbles to a stop, nearly trips.

 _Don’t look_ , Foggy tells himself sternly. _Don’t look, just ignore it_. But he’s shaken and longing and weak. He turns towards the voice, and his breath catches in his chest.

It’s Matt again, yes, but not as a child, and not as an adult. Standing before him is the same gangly, sweet-faced boy that Foggy fell in love with at first sight. Hunched posture, awkward smile, smooth face. This is a Matt that’s walked straight out of Foggy’s memories, pristine and untouched, a perfect replica in every way. Tears spring to Foggy’s eyes immediately.

“Hey, Matt,” he croaks out. “What’re you doing here?”

Matt shrugs, makes his lying face.

“Just. Um.”

Which is when Foggy realizes they’re standing outside Fogwell’s.

“Doing a little boxing?” Foggy asks, just to see what Matt will do.

What he does is pale dramatically and stammer.

“I’m. I don’t. I mean, why would I—”

He’s just  _so bad_  at lying. It would almost be funny if Matt wasn’t visibly freaking out.

“I already knew, dude, you can relax.”

“You... You did?”

Foggy has a hunch that this Matt-ghost isn’t going to leave until they talk. The other one didn’t, after all. So he sighs, brushes a hand against Matt’s to offer his arm, and leads him back into the deserted gym. The two of them settle on a long bench against the wall.

“I pretty much always knew,” Foggy admits finally, staring out at the empty boxing ring. “Figured you didn’t want to talk about it, like everything else.”

Next to him, Matt swallows. His fingers, still wrapped around Foggy’s arm, play with the fabric of his sleeve.

“Foggy?”

“Yeah...?”

Matt shakes his head, frowns.

“There’s something—” _Wrong about you_ , he doesn’t finish, though Foggy’s sure his supersenses have to be picking up some discrepancies to the Foggy he’s used to. “Can. Can I touch your face...?”

The request is strangely hesitant, for Matt, who’s always been fairly bold and determined when it came to his desires. Well, the ones he wasn’t repressing because he didn’t think he deserved nice things.

“Sure thing, buddy. Go for it.”

The sensation of Matt mapping his face is just as bizarre and intense as it was ten years ago. There’s more than one reason they’ve never done it since, but Foggy thinks his clear discomfort played a big part. Considering about eighty-five percent of that discomfort stemmed from his big bisexual crush on Matt, Foggy’s always felt a little bad about it. Even knowing what he does now, about the supersenses, he knows this is really the only way Matt has to take in Foggy’s, or anyone’s, face. He’s not sure if helps Matt picture what a person might look like because he’s not sure Matt’s brain is really wired that way anymore, but it’s more information, it’s a level of intimacy that he can use to replace the kind of eye contact sighted people take for granted.

It’s something he’ll never get a chance to do with anyone again, Foggy thinks suddenly, and his stomach swoops. Because Matt’s not really here. He’s dead.

“You— feel different,” Matt says at last, his thumb stroking across Foggy’s lip.

“I’m older,” Foggy replies, pulling away. “A lot older. It’s been a long time since we were in college, Matt.”

“And we’re still together?” Matt asks, looking so pleased and surprised that it breaks Foggy’s heart. “Maverick and Goose?”

“We— were. For a long, long time.”

Matt stands from the bench with a sudden lurch, his face carefully blank.

“Oh. I. I see. Did... Was there a reason? That you left?”

And Foggy is... He didn’t want to say it the first time. He doesn’t want to say it now either, but even that’s better than letting Matt think Foggy— what, got sick of him? Ditched him like his mom and his shitty mentor and Elektra?

“You died,” Foggy says hurriedly. “You... You  _died_ , Matt.”

The expression on Matt’s face becomes a different kind of blank.

“Oh. Oh, I... Oh.”

He takes a few shaky steps back to the bench and all but collapses into it. Foggy hesitantly wraps an arm around Matt’s skinny shoulders, and Matt clings to him like a lifeline.

“H-how did...?”

His reaction is more fearful than it was as a child, and maybe that should seem odd, but... Kid Matt had just come off being trained as a child soldier. College Matt... He wasn’t a vigilante. Wasn’t ever planning on becoming one. He still had faith in the law, in the system. He was probably just getting used to the idea that he was going to live a long, normal life. That he wasn’t going to go down in a fight like his dad.

“I’m sorry,” Foggy says, pulling Matt closer. “Jesus, buddy, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have—”

“Please,” Matt asks weakly, pressing his forehead to Foggy’s throat. “Please just tell me.”

“You started fighting. Not... Not in the ring, but— As a vigilante. Muggers, rapists, human traffickers.” Foggy’s throat goes tight, and he swallows a few times to try and clear it. “You, uh. There was this... Group, that was going to destroy the city. And you stopped them, but you. You didn’t make it out.”

“Ok,” Matt says, quiet and solemn, like he’s starting to prepare himself for that ending, and Foggy— hates that.

“I shouldn’t have let you go,” he confesses, wrapping his other arm around Matt as well like if he anchors this ghost here that somehow he’ll change the past. “I knew— I knew doing it would get you killed someday. I should have made you stay, I should have convinced you... You had so much ahead of you, a whole life, an apartment and cases and... And I couldn’t...”

There aren’t any more words. He just _couldn’t_ , and that was the end of it; couldn’t do anything, couldn’t stop anything. Couldn’t hold on to his best friend. It’s difficult to even swallow around the guilty lump in his throat, but Foggy tries anyway. Matt shakes his head, hair ruffling against Foggy’s collar.

“Nothing can stop me, you know that, Foggy. Not when I’ve made up my mind. But... You wanted a normal life for me,” Matt says gently. “A safe, happy, simple one. That’s— more than anyone has tried to give me for a long time.”

“You deserved it,” Foggy manages to say. “It’s— I wish I could have given it to you.”

Matt pulls back a little, taps the fingertips of one hand over Foggy’s wrung-out heart, matching its beat.

“I know. Thank you. You always... You see the best parts of me, Foggy. Make me feel like I... Like I’m worth it, just me. That I should be able to have good things just for existing. You... You deserve good things too.” 

It’s a goodbye, Foggy realizes suddenly. He’s being left again. He clutches Matt tighter, like that’ll do any good.

“You’re on your way now, ok?” Matt says, and he presses forward into the hug again. “You just have to keep going.”

Between one breath and the next, the weight of Matt is gone from his arms. He’s alone in a deserted gym. And he’s pretty sure there’s at least one more ghost waiting for him. Foggy can guess where, it’s not hard.

He doesn’t want to go. He doesn’t want to. But somehow his feet lead him there anyway. To the building that used to house Nelson and Murdock. And like a dream, Matt’s standing outside it waiting for him in a pool of yellow light. Not a child, or a teenager, but a man.

For the barest moment, Foggy thinks that it might really be Matt, his Matt. He steps closer in a daze, heart beating faster and faster—

But under the streetlight, his eyes can see what his heart cannot. There’s a small scar missing from Matt’s temple that tells Foggy he’s looking at yet another ghost. He exhales hard, air and hope both punched out of him by the truth.

Matt reaches out, faking a fumble as he grabs Foggy’s arm.

“Foggy?” He asks. “Everything ok, buddy?”

“Yeah,” lies Foggy. “Yeah. I’m fine, Matt.”

Because this is still a Matt who can’t call him on that. A Matt who’s still keeping his heightened senses a secret.

“We’ll make it work, Fog. I know... I know it scares you, stepping out on our own like this. But Nelson and Murdock is gonna do so much good for people, buddy. We...” Matt makes a determined face, nods like all it’ll take is his own force of will to make their dream come true. “We’re gonna change the world.”

“I don’t care about that,” Foggy says because this is the third time and he just wants it all to be over. “It doesn’t matter, none of this matters, it’s already too late. This already happened, Matt. You’re not here, you’re dead. You went out and got yourself killed trying to save this city and I don’t— I don’t want...”

“Ah,” Matt says, and— he _knows_.

He knows because there’s a purple bruise on his cheekbone, because he’s already gone out into the night and bought justice with his own blood. He’s already started fighting and he knows that the only thing that will stop him, the only thing that will silence the devil in his blood, is something that kills him.

“You found out,” Matt concludes. “About the mask. You must have been angry.”

Foggy scoffs.

“Seriously? You— Did you even hear me? You’re  _dead_ , Matt. There’s no point to... Holding on to things like that.”

What good would anger do? Or pain? Betrayal? Grief? None of it would bring Matt back. Matt nods, considers Foggy’s words with his hands folded behind his back.

“So I guess that means you’re doing perfectly ok, then, right?”

It’s— a leading question. But Foggy’s in too much pain to play it smart, and Matt knows when he’s lying anyway. The accusation in those words, that Foggy’s just fine, that he doesn’t care that Matt’s gone, is cutting and callous and it disregards everything he’s been through since the moment he and Karen were left staring at an empty doorway.

“You left me!” Foggy shouts at him, stupidly tearing up once again. “You left and you’re never coming back! How could I possibly be ok!”

“There it is,” Matt says warmly, smiling like he understands, like he gets it. “There’s the anger. You can’t just bottle it up, Fog. You always do that, you know? I think it’s a point of pride for you, to be the mature one, to muscle through and take care of everyone else even when you’re falling apart. But it’s ok to fall apart sometimes. It’s ok for you to show that you’re hurting.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Foggy says, low and angry and wounded. “Letting it out won’t bring you back. Nothing will bring you back. I sent you out there to die and I thought I was being a good friend! I thought I was helping protect you while you did what you had to do!”

Matt takes Foggy’s trembling hands in his, presses kisses to Foggy’s knuckles.

“Then you stood by me,” murmurs Matt, squeezing Foggy’s fingers lightly. “Believed in me. You have no idea how much that lightens my heart, Fog. I’m sorry that I let you down. But thank you. You’re so close now, buddy. Just a little more, I promise, and then it’ll all be ok.”

Like a benediction, he leaves one last kiss on Foggy’s brow. And then, like the others, he’s gone.

“Just a little more...?” Foggy asks the empty night, gutted.

How much more could anyone want to put him through? What more is he supposed to suffer tonight?

He knows, though. Of course he knows. Knows what has to be waiting for him at Matt’s apartment. What part of himself he’s supposed to tear open next. And he won’t do it.

Instead, he turns on his heel and starts sprinting for Clinton Church. Foggy’s not sure what he thinks about God, hasn’t been sure in a long time. But he hopes Matt’s church will drive away whatever demons are taunting him tonight. What he’s been through already is bad enough. Foggy doesn’t think he’ll be able to make it through the night if he has to confront Daredevil too.

The doors of the church are unlocked when he gets there. Breathless, Foggy stumbles inside, and finds the sanctuary alight like it’s waiting for him. There’s a red glow to everything at night that makes Foggy’s gut churn. He doesn’t even know what he mumbles to the nun who greets him before he sinks into a pew and cradles his head in his hands.

He’s startled from his stupor by a hand on his shoulder. His heart gives a fearful squeeze — is it another ghost? — but when Foggy looks up it’s only Matt’s priest.

“The nuns told me you were here, Franklin,” Father Lantom says gently, a kind look on his face. “And that you seemed troubled. Is there anything I can help you with?”

Foggy laughs bleakly, shrugs.

“I don’t suppose you know anything about ghosts, do you, Father?”

“I wouldn’t call myself an expert, no,” he says, settling into the pew next to Foggy and interlacing his fingers. “But I have some experience with the matter. Do you think you’re seeing ghosts?”

“It’s Matt,” Foggy chokes out, and a strange expression flashes across the priest’s face for a moment. “I keep... Three times tonight I’ve met him, but not... Not the age he would be now. One was just a boy, ten maybe. The next one was eighteen, from the year we met. And the last one was— from a few years ago, the day we opened the firm together. And I’m... God, I— Shit, sorry, Father— I’m. I’m terrified of what version of him I’ll see next. I don’t know what to do.”

“I see. It sounds like you’ve had a trying night, Franklin.”

“Is there—” Foggy knows he must sound desperate, foolish. “Is there some sort of, I don’t know, exorcism or something you could do? I’m kind of... I’m kind of at the end of my rope, here, I’ll try anything.”

Father Lantom studies Foggy’s face for a long time. Foggy isn’t sure what he sees there — fear, hopelessness, or just evidence of enough crying to fill the Hudson? At last, he nods and pats Foggy’s shoulder.

“I think I have something that might help. In the meantime, I’ve often found that prayer can be a good way to get my troubles off my chest. Perhaps it would soothe you to have a word with God while you wait.”

Foggy’s not too sure about that, but like he said, he’s willing to try anything. So as Father Lantom stands and strides off into the church, Foggy folds his hands, bows his head, and begins praying clumsily.

“If this is a lesson, I promise I’ve learned it by now,” he pleads several minutes into his feverish appeal. “And if it’s torture then please make it stop. I know I made mistakes where Matt was involved but I can’t fix those now. I would if I could but he’s. He’s—” Foggy swallows hard. “He’s gone. He’s gone and I know you don’t, like, hand out resurrections all willy-nilly. But it’s not like I have anything to lose and you more than anybody should know he’s a good person. Even if I don’t deserve to have him back he deserves to be here. All he’s ever done is try to make things better for people, to save the people no one else could help. I just— Fuck, I know it’s pointless to hope. Maybe no one’s really there, or maybe I’m just not worth listening to. I know it’s stupid to ask. But at least... Just please. No more ghosts tonight. I’m not... I can’t. Please.”

When Foggy opens his eyes again, his vision is fuzzy with unshed tears and his sinuses are burning. He scrubs at his eyes with the heel of his palm and stands from the pew on shaky legs.

Only then does he see that he’s not alone.

Standing at the front of the sanctuary, bloodied and cut up and wearing all black, with a piece of cloth in his hand that can only be a mask, is Matt.

“No,” Foggy chokes out, and the tears are back with a vengeance. “No more, I can’t— Please. Not this one, please.”

Because he knows this. Knows those clothes. And he can’t revisit that unbearable night that he thought Matt would die, not when he’s dead  _now_ , not when Foggy knows that saving him then was only a stopgap measure. That it was only borrowed time, spent too quickly.

Matt steps towards him, limping a little, and Foggy stumbles back.

“Foggy.”

It’s only one word, said in a quiet, pain-roughened voice. But there’s a wealth of meaning inside it. It’s not a greeting, it’s a plea. _Stay. Please stay_. And when has Foggy ever been able to resist Matt, even when it causes him pain?

Foggy can’t bring himself to move towards that pain, but he holds himself still and trembling as Matt approaches. He doesn’t stop until they’re chest to chest, and Foggy wants to retreat, to run, but he stays steady.

“Foggy,” Matt repeats, his voice as warm and soothing as a hot bath.

He removes a black glove with shaky fingers and presses his hand to Foggy’s face. Strokes his cheek, cradles his jaw. It would be so easy to sink into those caresses. So easy to pretend that they could last, but Foggy doesn’t have enough pieces of his heart left to survive if he gives them away to this ghost. If he lets himself believe this lie.

“You’re dead, Matty,” he says, the words like glass in his throat. “You— you died. Please don’t do this to me again.”

Matt shakes his head.

“I’m right here, Fog. I’m here.”

Still clutching his mask in one hand, he slides the other from Foggy’s jaw to his throat, over his shoulder, down his arm to the hand that rests — limp and hopeless — at his side. With a gentle grip, Matt circles Foggy’s wrist with his fingers, brings his palm up to press against Matt’s heart.

“See?” Matt asks him. “Feel my pulse. I’m here. I’m alive.”

But Foggy shakes his head, knows this is a lie even as he can’t bring himself to shift his hand from this proof of a life that’s long ended.

“The others had heartbeats too, Matt, all of them. But you know this isn’t right. We were at your apartment, then, and maybe you lived that night but you’re gone now. You’re gone and you’re not coming back, and I can’t— I can’t do this. Matty, please. I can’t take it.”

“I’m here,” Matt promised again. “I’m alive, Foggy. I—”

“No. No, please, I can’t—”

“I survived the explosion at Midland Circle, Foggy.”

The whole world judders to a halt. There’s no— no air, he can’t breathe, but he has to ask, has to—

“What did you say?” Foggy rasps, so weak only Matt would be able to hear.

A sweet, familiar smile crosses Matt’s bruised face.

“It’s me. I survived the explosion, Fogs,” Matt assures him, rubbing gentle fingers across the soft underside of Foggy’s wrist. “I’ve been recovering here, at the church. It’s... I wasn’t planning on coming back. On being Matt Murdock again. I thought it would be better— safer, if you never knew. But. But I heard you, tonight. I heard you, Foggy, and I couldn’t stay away.”

Foggy’s hand fists in Matt’s shirt and he hauls him into a hug. There’s nothing on earth that could make him let go of Matt now. He sobs like a baby, gasping and unrestrained, bleeds all the loss out through his tears.

“You a-asshole,” Foggy cries, thumping Matt on the back. “You dick! You were just gonna—” another ugly sob— “let me think you were dead forever? Do you have a-any idea how— You st-stupid asshole, I had nightmares! Every n-night!”

Matt rubs his back gently, rocks them back and forth and shushes Foggy, croons soothing words into his ear.

“I’ve got you, Foggy, just let it out. Shhh, shhh, just— It’s ok now. I’m here. It’s ok.”

Like the pain and the anger, Foggy’s energy drops away, and Matt has to haul him up when his legs go out from under him. Still murmuring reassurances, He ushers Foggy back into a pew, strokes a hand through his hair and doesn’t even try to disentangle Foggy’s iron grip on him.

“Matt,” Foggy stammers. “Matty, it’s... It’s really you this time, isn’t it? You won’t disappear like the others?”

Matt exhales, shakes his head.

“I’m not going anywhere, Foggy,” he promises.

There’s a soft press of lips at Foggy’s temple, and he leans further into Matt.

“I tried,” Foggy says quietly. “I tried so hard to keep going without you. But I just couldn’t, Matt. It wasn’t... I had everything I always thought I wanted but it was all empty without you there with me.”

“I’m sorry,” Matt tells him. “I’m so sorry. I never— never wanted to hurt you.”

The relief hits him all at once, and Foggy feels lighter, suddenly. Giddy and drunk because Matt is here. Really, truly here.

“I’d rather have you here and making shitty decisions than dead any day,” he tells Matt with a shaky laugh.

There’s a quiet, perfect chuckle in response.

“Then I’ve got good news for you, Fogs.”

“You’re going shopping for 75% off Halloween candy with me tomorrow?” jokes Foggy.

“Absolutely,” Matt replies, and though his tone is full of humor he sounds completely earnest.

“Good.” A yawn spills from Foggy’s mouth and he buries his face in Matt’s shoulder. “Gonna need your buff arms to carry it all.”

“Anything you want.”

What Foggy wants is to know everything that happened since Matt didn’t walk through the door with the rest of his superfriends after Midland Circle blew up. But what he wants more is to feel Matt’s heart beating strong and steady in his chest, so he says nothing. The past and the truth and the world can all wait. Can give them this, just a little time.

They stay where they are — dozing, pressed together — until the sun rises.


End file.
